Did You Know That Work Is Supposed To Be Easy?

The secret of the satisfied and successful is simple: the very best focus on their strengths and only ‘manage’ their weaknesses so these don’t hold them back. But they don’t ever allow themselves to be in an environment where their strengths take centre stage. Why then do so many of us end up in jobs struggling to improve our weaknesses rather than playing to our strengths? Marianne Cantwell takes a closer look and reveals the mind-sets and bad habits we all get into as far back as school...

Beethoven was a failure. His career as a legal secretary never took off. He was ok at it, but not the best in the world. Every Monday it was a drag to get out of bed. But he couldn’t quit. He’d worked hard for years to get where he was, and to get the skills he needed. Sure, it wasn’t his calling, but it was alright – another day another dollar, right?

Of course, that’s not true. Beethoven was known for his musical talents – but what if he was born in another family or era and if he never focussed on those skills? He’d most likely have been another average guy doing a mediocre job in an unsatisfied way.

Successful and satisfied people are successful for a reason – they have something they are really, really good at, and they do it. Because they’re really good at it, they do it better than anyone else. They stand out. It might be a skill, an approach, whatever, but they stick to it and it pays off. What’s more, they love it.

So why aren’t we all tapping into what we’re ‘outstandingly’ good at and happily doing it? There are a bundle of reasons, but in my experience it all comes back to two things:

1. The myth of ‘hard’

From a young age we are told a great big lie. That lie is “if it feels good it’s probably bad for you.” Another variation is “nothing worth doing was ever easy.” Or “if it tastes bad, it’s good for you.”

In our Anglo-Saxon-Protestant psychology, things that feel hard, uncomfortable, challenging are thought to be good. For example we associate healthy lifestyles with blandness and discipline (so unlike other cultures, a healthy diet is harsh and about denial).

Now with apologies to your school teacher/mother/the Daily Mail, I am going to say one thing that is vital to understand if you are going to achieve your ideal career: Easy Is Good.

Don’t get me wrong, easy is not the same as lazy. It’s not about avoiding work. Easy is that feeling when you do something and feel energised, time flies, and whatever you’re doing definitely doesn’t feel like work. It’s something you’d do for free and love.

The things you are best at are (ironically) those which you find easiest. For me that feeling comes when I am writing or speaking in front of audiences (yes, I know, that’s weird). For others it comes when analysing a complex piece of data (no, really). For others it comes when combining colours to make a room perfect.

Whatever that ideal ‘easy’ thing is for you, here’s a clue: you probably can’t think of it right now. You can probably only think of the things you have worked really hard to get ‘good’ at but still don’t enjoy.

If that is the case, why can’t you think of that thing that is easy and ‘joyful’ for you? Here’s why:

2. The dominance of ‘average’

Richard Branson is an awful organiser. He couldn’t be a finisher-completer to save his lif… hey a new idea! Oh yes, and he flits on to a new idea before finishing the last… ooh, a new airline! You get the picture: he’s not going to be world-class PA anytime soon.

But here’s his secret: Richard Branson doesn’t try to be the most organised kid on the block. He doesn’t try to be a finisher-completer. He knows that he could do those things, but he would be average at them. Instead he put himself in an environment where what he DOES do best (get great ideas, think big picture, and be a marketing genius, among other things) is what he does most of the time. And as we all know, he does these very, very well.

This approach of focussing on our strengths and only ‘managing’ our weaknesses is one most of us don’t take.

At school the focus was on getting you up to average. You got tuition for your weaker subjects. Your focus was getting those Cs to Bs and Bs to As. Your weaknesses were combated – but what happened to your strengths? Not much.

This may be the way to a neat report card at school, but it is not the way to happiness or success in the real world. In the real world, most people stick in ‘school mode’ for the rest of their career. They waste time and energy lamenting their weaknesses, trying to improve them, and letting their strengths slide by in the meantime.

The secret of the satisfied and successful is simple: the very best focus on their strengths and only ‘manage’ their weaknesses so these don’t hold them back. But they don’t ever allow themselves to be in an environment where their strengths don’t take centre stage.

If Richard Branson hadn’t been brave enough to toss out our society’s work ethic and obsession with ‘getting up to average’ he would have most likely had a mediocre career being totally scatty in an office. His boss would have written ‘development points’ about his lack of focus and organisation. He would have felt frustrated and constrained about the need to do things by the book. He probably wouldn’t own his own island

• What could you do if you focussed on what makes you ‘great’?
• What would happen if you spent time identifying and developing what comes easily and naturally to you?
• What would happen if you stopped berating yourself for not being ‘good enough’ at other things?